


The Sun Will Come Out

by hollyhobbit101



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hopeful Ending, Hurt No Comfort, POV Harry Potter, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, i guess?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-23 22:46:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11999502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollyhobbit101/pseuds/hollyhobbit101
Summary: How could tomorrow be better when tomorrow wouldn't exist for so many people - so many friends?





	The Sun Will Come Out

When the dust had settled, they all tried to tell him to sleep.

"Tomorrow," they said. "Everything will be better tomorrow."

Harry didn't understand how they could say that because how could tomorrow be better when tomorrow wouldn't exist for so many people - so many friends? Why was he allowed to see another day, and maybe another few after that, but others couldn't have one more sunrise? He didn't respond to their prompting, only stared numbly across the cracked flagstones until Hermione took his arm and quietly led him away to the temporary camp near the Black Lake.

He didn't sleep that night until tomorrow bled into today and the sky turned grey with the first sunrise since.

* * *

The sun came out that day. It was like the musical, Harry thought wryly. The sun will come out tomorrow, indeed. Only, this time it didn't clear away all the cobwebs and the sorrow; it magnified it. The sun shone and illuminated every crack in Hogwarts' ancient stones, reflected off every unshed tear in each survivors' eyes. Harry moved as if in a trance, doing his part to help clean up and rebuild, but never really registering anything outside of his own thoughts and grief. More than once he found himself wishing that tomorrow had never come at all.

* * *

They couldn't begin to clear the Great Hall until the bodies were moved. Nobody wanted to volunteer to do it, and everybody was surprised when Harry stepped forward. "I'll do it," he said, his voice quiet, yet it echoed loud in the silence. People were quick to offer their help after that, rallying behind the Boy Who Lived to dedicate their tomorrow to helping those who never got one.

* * *

It was a grim affair. For the first time in centuries, Hogwarts allowed Muggles onto the grounds to allow the families of muggleborns and half-bloods to mourn their children. The few remaining wards around the school were disabled so people could Apparate in and out. The wails of parents, siblings, and children filled the air, and Harry felt his heart twist at the thought that some of them could have been prevented if only he had acted quicker. He excused himself from the scene, telling Ron to come and get him when it was time.

* * *

Night had fallen by the time they were ready. Hagrid had constructed several funeral pyres which, once they had been cleaned and wrapped, bore the bodies of the witches and wizards who had died defending Hogwarts. Any dead Death Eaters were left to rot in a mass grave somewhere deep in the Forbidden Forest. The blaze from the pyres lit up the night sky, and Harry watched until the last ember had burnt itself out and another tomorrow had begun.

* * *

The tomorrows kept on coming, and each one simultaneously felt better and worse. A year passed, then ten, then twenty, and slowly the hurt lessened. Every so often, though, he would see a kid with a camera bouncing around his neck that reminded him of Colin, or he'd pass George in the street and think how lonely he looked without his twin beside him, and the knife would twist ever deeper.

* * *

After too many tomorrows to count the memories turned soft, and he would think of the dead fondly, without much grief or sorrow. There were good days and there were bad days, but Harry knew that the world would always have another tomorrow, even if some didn't.


End file.
